…A Dangerous Thing (19 page)

"I could, but I'm not."

Burns decided to head off what appeared to be an argument.
 
"I have something else I need to know, Earl."

"What's that?"

"The name of that student who complained to you about Henderson."

"I told you I didn't think I could give you her name."

"It's a murder case now," Burns reminded him.
 
"Would you rather me talk to the student, or Boss Napier?"

"Well, since you put it that way. . . ."

"I don't want to hear this," Tomlin said.
 
"I'm not a detective."
 
He threw his cigarette to the floor.
 
"I'll see you guys later."

When Tomlin was out the door, Burns said, "Her name, Earl?"

"Kristi Albert.
 
Kristi with a
K
.
 
And with an
i
on the end."

"Thanks," Burns said.
 
"I'll keep this confidential."

"Just get me off the hook with Napier.
 
That's all I ask."

"I'll do what I can," Burns promised, though he wasn't sure he could do anything at all.

N
ext Burns wanted to talk to Walt
Melling
.
 
He went to the recruiting office, hoping that
Melling
was in.
 
When he had an especially long recruiting trip on the weekend, he sometimes left before noon on Friday.

The former football player was in his office, however, sitting at his desk when Burns walked in.
 
Burns sat down, which was not so painful today, and made small talk for a few seconds and then reached inside his jacket for the recruiting brochure he had picked up in Henderson's office.

"What's that?"
Melling
asked.

Burns laid it on the desk.
 
"You've seen a lot of them, I'm sure."

Everyone knew that
Melling
was never without a handful of the colorful blue and white pamphlets stuffed into his jacket pockets.

"Have I ever,"
Melling
said.
 
"What's so special about this one?"

"There's nothing special about the brochure," Burns said.
 
"But there's something special about where I found it."

Melling
was suddenly wary.
 
"What's that to me?"

"It was found in Tom Henderson's office."
 
Burns hoped the passive voice might imply that the police had found the brochure instead of him.

Melling
leaned back in his chair.
 
"Big deal.
 
There are thousands of these things all over this campus."

"This one has your fingerprints all over it," Burns said, a blatant lie, since Burns hadn't the least idea about how fingerprints were obtained.
 
And if there had been any of
Melling's
fingerprints on the brochure, they were probably gone by now.
 
Burns had been handling the thing himself for hours before even thinking about the possibility of fingerprints.

"So what?
 
I've touched nearly all of those pamphlets at one time or another."

"The way we put it together," Burns said, using the royal
we
and hoping it would mislead
Melling
into thinking that Burns had already discussed things with the police, "you were in Tom's office on the afternoon he was killed.
 
You probably dropped this brochure then."

Melling
patted his jacket pockets, pulled out a recruiting pamphlet and showed it to Burns.
 
"I carry these things everywhere.
 
I could have dropped it anytime.
 
And besides, I'm not the only one who carries recruiting brochures around, you know."

"I know," Burns said.
 
"But the third floor isn't on any of the recruiting schedules that I've seen, and you're the only one who might have had a reason to be in Henderson's office."
 
He held up his own pamphlet.
 
"And this one has your fingerprints on it."

Melling
put the pamphlet he was holding back in his pocket.
 
Then he sat forward and leaned his forearms on his desk.
 
"All right, Burns.
 
So I was in Henderson's office.
 
Big deal.
 
What's the harm with going by and talking to someone?"

"You told me that you were here at your desk when Henderson fell."

"That's exactly where I was.
 
I was working on some expense sheets."

"So you couldn't have killed him."

Melling
moved his hands from the top of the desk and held them out of
Burns's
sight.
 
Burns imagined them balling into hard fists.

"That's right,"
Melling
said.
 
"I didn't kill him.
 
I wanted to smash his wormy little face in.
 
He deserved it, but I didn't do that, either."

Melling
was lying, and Burns knew it.
 
He couldn't explain how he knew, but he was certain of it.
 
Something in
Melling's
tone of voice gave him away, that and the rapid reddening of his face.
 
Napier had told Burns and Elaine that Henderson had been struck in the face before his fall.
 
Burns was sure that
Melling
was the one who had hit him.

"Why didn't you hit him?" Burns asked, deciding to take a chance on getting his own wormy face smashed in.
 
"After all, he said something about your wife's breasts, didn't he?
 
Let's see, how did he put it?"

Burns didn't get a chance to say how Henderson had put it because
Melling
stood up, reached for Burns, grabbed his jacket, and pulled him halfway across the desk.

"I told you,"
Melling
said, his face purple.
 
"People shouldn't say things like that.
 
And you shouldn't repeat them, either."

He shoved Burns back into the chair, and this time
Burns's
tailbone gave a healthy twinge.

"You should have a checkup, Walt," Burns said.
 
"Your color's bad.
 
You probably have high blood pressure."

"Don't you talk about my blood pressure, you little . . . insect."

Burns didn't know whether being an insect was better than being a worm or not.
 
"Walt, I think you should talk to me about what happened in Tom's office."

Melling
was breathing hard.
 
"I've told you all I have to tell.
 
And you can go squealing to the cops if you want to.
 
I don't give a damn.
 
Now get out of here."

Burns thought about prolonging the conversation, but it would look bad if one of the suspects had a stroke before anything was proved against him.
 
So Burns started to leave quietly.

Melling
was still standing behind his desk, his fists resting on top.
 
His face wasn't quite so purple now, and he was getting his breathing under control.

It was sad to see a former athlete go to seed like that, and Burns, the old second baseman, vowed not to let it happen to him.

"Wait a second,"
Melling
said, just as Burns stepped through the door.

Burns turned around.
 
Melling
didn't look quite so malevolent now.

"There's one thing I forgot,"
Melling
said.

Burns stood in the doorway, but he didn't re-enter the office.
 
"What's that?"

"I saw somebody that afternoon.
 
Just as I was leaving Henderson's office."

"Who?" Burns asked.

"I don't know her, but I'm sure she's a student.
 
I've seen her on campus."
 
Melling
went on to describe a woman who seemed to look a lot like the one Burns had seen fleeing Henderson's office in tears.
 
"She's the one you should be talking to,"
Melling
concluded.
 
"Not me."

"You could be right about that," Burns said.

But he wasn't convinced.
 
Maybe Melling had actually seen someone, but he could have seen her before going to Henderson's office.
 
Or maybe he hadn't seen her at all.
 
Maybe he'd heard about Kristi Albert and decided to use her to his advantage.
 
Nevertheless, it was one more thing Burns would have to check out as soon as he got a chance.
 
There were a couple of other things he wanted to do first.

T
hat afternoon Burns went around to talk to Eric Holt, hoping that he would have better luck than he'd had with
Melling
.
 
It couldn't be any worse, that was for sure.

He was going to have to talk to Napier again soon, too.
 
It was time to put the police chief in the picture about what was really going on before he wasted too much time questioning people like
Joynell
and Rae.
 
Walt
Melling
was a much more likely suspect than Mal Tomlin or Earl Fox.

And then there was Holt.
 
Things just weren't right there, though it was hard to say what was wrong.
 
Burns remembered something that Dean Partridge had told him and Napier:
 
"Dr. Henderson's death has nothing to do with the past."
 
Burns wasn't sure that was true, but he still hadn't found out all he wanted to know about Holt's past.

The third floor of Main was practically deserted.
 
On Friday afternoons, there was generally no one there except Holt.
 
Burns, like the rest of the faculty, believed that Friday afternoons were not created for staying on campus, and he was there only to catch Holt alone.

Holt was in his office, watching an old Republic serial on the video monitor that he had on permanent loan from Student Services.
 
Burns, on the other hand, was lucky if he could get a monitor to show snippets from the two film versions of
The Great Gatsby
to his classes, but Holt had Dean Partridge to go to bat for him.
 
Therefore he got to have a VCR and monitor in his office.

Burns recognized the serial; it was
The Masked Marvel
, not one of
Burns's
favorites, but still worth watching.

"Some pretty good stunt work in that one," he said from Holt's open doorway.

Holt froze the picture and turned to see who was there.
 
"Good afternoon, Dr. Burns.
 
Do you know about Tom Steele?"

"He was The Masked Marvel, but he didn't get any screen credit.
 
Doubled some stunts for the bad guys, too, didn't he?"

Holt was as impressed as someone else might have been had Burns been able to recite a passage from
Antigone
in classical Greek.
 
"That's right.
 
You know your serials, Dr. Burns."

"Some of them, anyway," Burns said.
 
"Mind if I come in?"

"Please do.
 
We can watch chapter eight."

"I don't really have time for that.
 
I wanted to talk to you about something else."

"All right."
 
Holt turned off the VCR and monitor.
 
"What did you have in mind?"

"I guess you've heard about Tom Henderson."

Holt looked concerned.
 
"Yes.
 
Terrible thing.
 
Just terrible.
 
I'm sure the students were greatly affected.
 
It was an excellent idea for Dean Partridge to set up grief counseling for them."

Burns, who didn't want to talk about grief counseling, studied Holt's face, trying to get some idea of what the chin would be like without the beard.
 
It was impossible to tell.
 
The eyes were right, though.

"Yes," he said.
 
"But I'm sure it was harder on you than on most of the students."

Holt who had been leaning back in his chair, sat up a little straighter.
 
"What?
 
Why?"

"Well, I had the impression that you and Henderson knew one another from way back.
 
Weren't you in college together?"

"Of course not.
 
Whatever gave you that idea?"

Burns shrugged.
 
"Something Tom said one day.
 
About your looking like someone he knew in school.
 
He seemed pretty sure he remembered you."